LANGHAM, John (1584-1671), of Crosby House, Bishopsgate, London and Cottesbrooke, Northants.

John Langham was descended from a branch of the de Langhams of Normandy who accompanied William the Conqueror to England.28Northants. RO, L(C) 358. The family originally held lands in Suffolk and Rutland but by the sixteenth century they had settled in Northamptonshire.29Add. 24121, f. 24. Langham’s father was a linen draper in Northampton but the family later moved to Guilsborough.30Northants. RO, L(C) 918, p. 278. After his father’s death in 1607, Langham, ‘not being well used by his mother, resolved to leave her and not to return till he should do it with a considerable fortune’.31Northants. RO, L(C) 918, p. 278. He went to London, where, in 1620, he married the daughter of a leatherseller, James Bunce.32Soc. Gen. Boyd’s Inhabitants 5019. In 1621 he became ‘assistant’ to a Turkey merchant, Sir Robert Napier, in whose employ he spent a considerable amount of time in the Near East as a factor and ‘made such a return as highly pleased his master’. After obtaining his freedom, Langham became an active member of the East India and Levant Companies in his own right, trading initially with half his wife’s portion of £3,000, and he supplemented this income by providing financial services to others, including bills of exchange 33Northants. RO, L(C) 918, p. 278-80; CSP Col. E.I. 1625-9, pp. 298, 437-8, 601; 1630-4, p. 338; CSP Dom. 1629-31, p. 11; 1636-7, p. 1; HMC De L’Isle and Dudley vi. 127. His fortune was allegedly secured by one expedition in the mid-1630s which allowed him to corner the market in dried fruit, and ‘when it was known that all the currants were in one hand and no more to come that year, all hastened to buy and he soon paid his debts and raised his fame and cleared £30,000 for himself’.34Northants. RO, L(C) 918, p. 282. Langham associated with leading Puritan merchants in London, including Mathew Cradock*, with whom he petitioned the admiralty against the seizure of their ships for the king’s service in January 1637.35CSP Dom. 1636-7, p. 412. Two years later he began negotiations to purchase an estate at Cottesbrooke in Northamptonshire, initially in partnership with other London merchants, among them (Sir) Thomas Soame*.36CSP Dom. 1638-9, p. 288; CSP Dom. 1625-49, p. 753. In 1640 he acquired as his London residence Crosby House is Bishopsgate, as security for a £3,000 loan to the 2nd earl of Northampton (Spencer Compton†) that was never repaid.37CCC 3272.

Langham’s chief interest was in trade and he was an extremely reluctant public official: twice he preferred to pay a fine rather than become third warden of the Grocers’ Company in 1638, citing ‘many serious occasions and employments in the country’ as his excuse, and he declined to serve as master warden in 1640.38GL, Grocers’ Co. Cal. Min. Bks.; W.W. Grantham, List of Wardens of Grocers‘ Co. 1345-1907 (1907), 25-6. In the new year of 1642 he again resisted promotion. Formally elected alderman on 11 January, he suffered a period of imprisonment in Newgate rather than accept the post, and it was only after a writ of habeas corpus and the hearing of the case in king’s bench that he agreed to take the oath on 12 May.39Woodhead, Rulers of London, 105; CLRO, Rep. 55, ff. 355, 424v; CSP Dom. 1641-3, p. 272. He did not avoid the shrievalty in July 1642, however, and in the early weeks of civil war he worked closely with the lord mayor, Isaac Penington*, and his co-sheriff, Thomas Andrews, to arrange for a City assessment to pay for the raising of forces by Parliament.40Cal. Ct. Mins. E.I. Co. 1640-3, p. 262; Clarendon, Hist. ii. 399-400; CCAM 1-2. In February 1643 the king, dissatisfied with the way his declaration to the City had been made public, called on Langham and Andrews to read it again and also demanded the arrest of Penington and other leading citizens accused of treason; but the two sheriffs complied with Parliament’s order not to obey.41CSP Ven. 1642-3, p. 236; CJ ii. 974b. In the same period Langham was involved with Soame in defying a parliamentary order prohibiting the importation of currants. With the support of such heavyweights as John Pym* and Sir Christopher Yelverton*, and in acknowledgement of his ‘affection to the Parliament’, in May the Commons eventually agreed to allow Langham to unload and sell the goods.42CJ iii. 10a, 26a, 27a, 29a, 30a, 55b, 57a, 86a, 88a, 91b, 92a; CSP Ven. 1642-3, pp. 232, 254; Add. 31116, pp. 80, 101-2. They may have been swayed by Langham’s evident zeal for the cause. In April he had been made responsible for raising new regiments in London to guard the City’s recently completed fortifications and to support the field army under the 3rd earl of Essex.43CJ iii. 48b; LJ vi. 9b; HMC 5th Rep., 81. In June he prepared the Guildhall for the trial of those involved in Edmund Waller’s* royalist plot, and was ordered to attend the proceedings.44CJ iii. 146b. Later in the same month Langham, Andrews and Penington were given command of the Tower in the absence of its lieutenant.45CJ iii. 177b. Langham’s financial expertise no doubt lay behind his appointment as commissioner and treasurer of the excise in July and governor of the customs and excise office in September, but in October he asked to be discharged from the excise commission ‘in respect of his other great and necessary occasions’.46CJ iii. 267b-268a; A. and O.; LJ vi. 250a-b.

His reticence may have been the result of an on-going legal dispute between him and a number of other merchants, including one Captain John Lymbrey, over the recovery of a debt, that had simmered for many years and erupted anew at the end of October with a series of petitions to the House of Lords.47LJ vi. 285b, 301a, 306a, 543a, 544a, 568a; HMC 5th Rep., 112. Controversy over his business affairs may have led to Langham’s rejection as governor of the Levant Company in February 1644, with Penington being elected instead.48SP105/150, f. 549. A month later Langham was appointed by the common council as treasurer for the ‘weekly meal’ subscription which would fund further auxiliary forces, but in April Parliament examined him on charges of having criticised the raising of troops for Essex’s army, on the grounds that the earl’s loyalty to Parliament was suspect.49A. and O.; HMC 6th Rep., 11. In July Langham was nominated as governor of the East India Company, but not elected.50Cal. Ct. Mins. E.I. Co. 1644-9, p. 31. In the spring of 1645 Langham’s fortunes seem to have improved. In April he was ordered by the common council to implement an ordinance for the repayment of debts incurred in fortifying and guarding the City.51CSP Dom. 1644-5, p. 408. In August 1645 he was added to the London militia committee.52A. and O.; LJ vi. 250a-b. At the end of August and the beginning of September he was also appointed to commissions concerned with providing money for the garrisons and militia of his native Northamptonshire.53LJ vii. 557b, 575b. There were still doubts about him in some quarters, however, and in February 1646, when he was nominated as governor of the Levant Company for a second time, Penington was again elected instead.54SP105/150, f. 101v.

As 1646 continued, Langham increasingly aligned himself with the Presbyterians in the City, and sat on committees concerning the City remonstrance and the letter to the king inviting him to return to London in May and June.55Brenner, Merchants and Revolution, 482-3, 490-1. At the end of September he put forward as a candidate for lord mayor by ‘the violent Presbyterians’, who knew that Langham was sound on religious matters, as he had ‘resolved not to suffer private meetings’ and conventicles.56Juxon Jnl. 137. It was also said that Langham enjoyed the support of the Scottish commissioners who ‘laboured much and were in full confidence to have Alderman Langham lord mayor of London’, but were outmanoeuvred by their ‘cunning opponents’ in the Independent faction.57Baillie, Letters and Jnls. ii. 400. The result of this faction-fighting was the election of a crypto-royalist candidate acceptable to neither side, and at this point, according to Thomas Juxon*, Langham lost his temper: ‘being a violent man (like an English mastiff, whatsoever you set him upon can hardly pull off), would have been furious against the Independents, and occasioned clashing with the Parliament and common council’.58Juxon Jnl. 137.

After this debacle, Langham’s position became increasingly difficult. At the end of October 1646 his suit with Captain Lymbrey was revived in the House of Lords, and the proceedings continued at a snail’s pace through November, December and into the new year of 1647.59LJ viii. 556b, 557b, 560a, 570a, 573b-574a, 583b, 586b, 591b-592a, 604b, 635b, 670b, 680a-b, 683a, 697b; ix. 25b-26a, 32b, 49a. A summary of the case was ordered at the beginning of March, and it was subsequently referred to the judges who were ordered to report at the start of the new legal term, leading to further proceedings throughout the summer.60LJ ix. 53b-54b, 57a, 160b, 173b, 202b, 204b, 247b, 286a, 290b, 304a, 307a, 328b, 338a, 340a, 349b, 407b. In the meantime, Langham continued to be a controversial figure in the City. On 10 December he was suspected of being in cahoots with those Presbyterians, including his brother-in-law, James Bunce, and Thomas Adams and Samuel Avery*, who promoted the London petition against the army.61Juxon Jnl. 142; Brenner, Merchants and Revolution, 482-3. In February 1647, he was again rejected as governor of the Levant Company.62SP105/150, f. 141v. In March he and three other recently appointed trustees for the sale of bishops’ lands, including Thomas Adams* and John Jones II*, asked to be discharged, possibly under pressure from their political opponents.63A. and O.; LJ ix. 59b. During the political crisis in the spring and summer of 1647, Langham’s association with the Presbyterians began to pay dividends. On 4 May he was appointed to the new City militia committee, and he was included in the assessment commission of 23 June and re-appointed to the militia committee on 23 July.64A. and O.; Rushworth, Hist. Collns. vi. 634. Langham opposed the army’s proposal to put the City militia under the control of a parliamentary committee and he was suspected of encouraging the mob which forced Parliament to revoke the resulting Militia Ordinance on 26 July, and of assisting the raising of troops to defend the City in the days that followed.65LJ x. 217b-219b.

In September 1647, after the New Model had re-established Independent hegemony, Langham, the lord mayor and three other aldermen (including his brother-in-law James Bunce), were committed to the Tower for their part in the events of July.66CJ v. 315b; Whitelocke, Mems. ii. 213-4; CSP Dom. 1645-7, p. 600; CCSP i. 391. Langham later claimed that the timing of his imprisonment was intended ‘to prevent my being chosen lord mayor the Michaelmas following’.67CLRO, Rem. 9, 5v-6. Several pamphlets appeared vindicating the aldermen’s actions and claimed that they had ‘served the state with ... uprightness, faithfulness, constancy and courage’.68A Paire of Spectacles for the City (1647, E.419.9); Vox Civitatis (1647); A Declaration of Sir John Gaire (1647); CSP Dom. 1648-9, pp. 16-17. While articles of impeachment were being drawn up against him, Langham continued to conduct his business affairs from prison, leasing Crosby House with its warehouse and cellars to the East India Company in February 1648.69Cal. Ct. Mins. E.I. Co. 1644-9, p. 257. In March formal charges were at last brought against Langham and his fellow prisoners, in which they were accused of ‘levying war against the king, Parliament and the kingdom, and of other high crimes and misdemeanours’.70CJ v. 495a, 507b; LJ x. 125a-b. Articles of impeachment, drawn up by the Commons, were read in the Lords on 21 April.71LJ x. 213b, 217b-219b. Despite his protests that the lieutenant of the Tower, Robert Tichborne*, had no authority over him, Langham was brought before the Lords on 25 April.72HMC 7th Rep., 23; LJ x. 223a. He joined his fellow prisoners in refusing to kneel at the bar as a delinquent and instead presented a petition requesting trial by common law; he was fined £500 for his contempt.73LJ x. 231b-232a, 233a-b; Whitelocke, Mems. ii. 303. He remained in the Tower until June when the City again petitioned for the release of their aldermen. Parliament, anxious not to alienate the City at a time when a royalist force was heading towards London, agreed to drop all charges, and Langham was released on 6 June.74CJ v. 584a; LJ x. 307b, 308b. Langham was treated with respect by the citizens, and was allowed to transfer his seat on the aldermanic bench from Portsoken to Bishopsgate ‘by virtue of his precedence’ in August 1648.75CLRO, Rep. 59, f. 265. He continued to be active within the mercantile community and to attend committees of the common council until the spring of 1649.76CSP Dom. 1648-9, p. 310; J.E. Farnell, ‘The Politics of the City of London’ (Chicago Univ. PhD thesis, 1963), 400. But he was still regarded with suspicion by Parliament, receiving no more appointments to local commissions; and on 7 April 1649 he was discharged from the court of aldermen by what he disparagingly referred to as ‘a resolve of that remain of an House of Commons that presumed to sit as a Parliament’.77CJ vi. 181b; CLRO, Rep. 59, ff. 371-2; Rem. 9, f. 5v. In April 1651 he was suspected of financing royalist plots but no action was taken against him.78HMC Portland i. 585.

In July 1654, at the age of 70, Langham was elected MP for the City, coming fourth in the poll.79Harl. 6810, ff. 164-5; HMC 6th Rep., 437. Langham claimed ‘the City retained those kind remembrances of me and my sufferings’ despite the ‘displeasure of those who usurped the government and my being out of their sight in the country’.80CLRO, Rem. 9, f. 5v. Not surprisingly, Langham was summoned before the council’s committee for elections on 25 August.81CSP Dom. 1654, pp. 335-6; SP18/75/20. His election was opposed by Tichborne who, in a petition to the protector and his council, argued that Langham and Adams did not qualify to take their seats under the terms of the Instrument of Government, and his exclusion was confirmed by ‘a very full House’ on 6 September.82Perfect Diurnal no. 20 (4-11 Sept. 1654), 149 (E.233.26). Langham’s eldest son, James, was elected to the second Protectorate Parliament as MP for Northamptonshire.

Although Langham had at last been elected governor of the Levant Company in 1654, for the remainder of the protectorate he seems to have spent most of his time in Northamptonshire.83Beaven, Aldermen of London ii. 66. In 1657 he was resident in Knaresborough, where he did his best to undermine the anti-royalist mayor of Northampton, telling Lord Hatton that at a recent assembly the mayor had ‘invited only his own confidants and omitted those who are either known or suspected to be our friends in the House’.84Add. 29550, f. 294-5. Langham was appointed to the assessment commission for Northamptonshire in June of the same year.85A. and O. In August 1658 he agreed a year’s lease of his Crosby House to the East India Company.86Cal. Ct. Mins. E.I. Co. 1655-9, p. 280. He had returned to London by January 1660, when he was one of those who provided £5,000 for Charles Stuart as a ‘testimonial’ of his intentions and, with Sir John Robinson†, he acted as an intermediary between the exiled royalists and the City.87Mordaunt Letterbk., 163, 177; CCSP iv. 532. Langham was elected MP for Southwark in the Convention in April, and in the following months raised considerable sums for the king.88CJ viii. 20b. In May he joined Bunce as one of the City’s representatives sent to wait on Charles II at The Hague, where both he and his eldest son were knighted.89Diurnal of Thomas Rugg, ed. Sachse (Cam. Soc. ser. 3, xci), 81; CJ viii. 19b; Shaw, Knights of Eng. ii. 225. The king, who allegedly declared that he was ‘more obliged to that man's purse than to any private man’s in England’, made Langham a baronet under a warrant of 31 May, waiving the usual fees.90Northants. RO, L(C) 918, p. 284; Eg. 2551, f. 5v; CSP Dom. 1660-1, p. 44. Langham was restored to the aldermanic bench by the king’s order in August 1660, but he excused himself on account of his age. 91CLRO, Jor. 41x, f. 240v; Rem. 9, f. 5v. In June 1661 he was, apparently reluctantly, a candidate in a disputed election at Southwark, but the election committee decided against him.92CJ viii. 280b.

Langham died on 13 May 1671 at Crosby House and was buried at Cottesbrooke on 7 June.93Northants. RO, L(C) 921, p. 176; L(C) 922, p. 238. Despite his earlier reputation as ‘most violent man’, he was now portrayed as ‘truly the best of men, a benefactor as dear to the highest as to the middle and lowest folk’.94Northants. RO, L(C) 921, p. 180. His charitable foundations included a free school in Guilsborough and an almshouse at Cottesbooke.95Northants. RO, L(C) 918, p. 262; Bridges, Northants. i. 569. His will, drawn up in November 1670, provided bequests of £10,000 to his two younger sons, Sir William and Stephen, and other sums for his daughters. He also left legacies to the Grocers’ Company, to various hospitals in London and Northamptonshire, and for the rebuilding of three London churches.96PROB11/336/292; Add. 24121, f. 24v. He was succeeded by his eldest son, Sir James Langham.